
aass_i:___Ui_2_ 

Book. II -3 B>8 



HISTORY ?^ 



OF 



ELAWARE COUNTY - 



FOR THE 



PAST CENTURY. 



/ 

By Hon. John M. Broomall. 



I 



Read before the Delaware County Institute of 

Science and Filed with the Congressional 

Librarian at Washington. 



- '"0; 



Mhdia, Pa: 
Yebnon & CooPEB, Steam Power Book Pbinters, 

1876. 



7'"- 



1- 15-^ 



.1 ' / , / 






History of Delaware County. 



To the Delaware County Institue of Science : — 

The undersigned, appointed at the meeting of the Institute 
in May last to prepare a brief history of Delaware County for 
the century just now closing, respectfully submits the following 
report : 

The appointment was made pursuant to a recommenda- 
tion of the National and State authorities that such outlines of 
history be prepared for every City and County in the Union, 
to be read on the Fourth of July, 1876, and preserved as mat- 
ter of local history for future reference and use. What is 
desired is to make a record of the progress of the County 
materially, morally, and politically during the last century. — 
The task imposed is rendered easy up to i860 by the elabor- 
ate and valuable "History of Delaware County," published in 
that year by the President of the Institute, Dr. George Smith. 
Indeed, little has been attempted prior to that date except to 
extract from that work in a condensed form such materials as 
were supposed to be appropriate to a brief review of the cen- 
tury called for. Tendering thanks to the author for the val- 
uable aid rendered by the work is but feebly expressing the 
obligations of the people of the County to their historian. 

The territory embraced within the limits of Delaware 
County contained the earliest European settlements in Penn- 
sylvania, but the County as a municipal organization was not 
created until 1789. The first settlers were Swedes who 
came about the year 1640, and located themselves along 
the Delaware River. Many of the present inhabitants of the 
County are descendants of these people and their names, 
sometimes more or less changed, are still common among us. 
The settlements were within the limits of Chester County, 
one of the three laid off by Penn at the founding of his 
colony, the other two being Philadelphia and Bucks. These 
Counties abutted on the eastward upon the Delaware, and 
extended westward without definite limits. In 1729 the 



4 HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY. 

County of Lancaster was created on the west of Chester, and 
thus the boundaries of Chester County became fixed. They 
remained the same until the division of the County in 1789. 

Delaware County owes its existence to a contest about 
the seat of Justice of Chester County. The little village of 
Chester, being on the river, and about the middle of the 
settlements, was the seat of government of the colony from 
its commencement until the laying out of Philadelphia. — 
After that time it continued to be the seat ot Justice of Chester 
County. As the settlements extended westward the location 
of the Courts and records became more and more inconve- 
nient to the average population, and from this arose the project 
of removing the seat of Justice inland. The site selected was 
a place in Goshen Township, called "The Turk's Head" from 
the sign of the tavern which constituted almost the entire 
village. The movement began in 1780 and lasted some half 
dozen years, ending in success. The new seat of Justice was 
called West Chester, and the first Court was held there in 
November, 1786. 

The people of Chester and its vicinity were so exasperat- 
ed by what had been done, that they applied to the Legislature 
and in 1789 procured an act erecting Delaware County out 
of the eastern portion of the old County and fixing the County 
seat at Chester. The townships so cut off were Aston, Bethel, 
Chester, Concord, Darby, Upper Darby, Upper Chichester, 
Lower Chichester, Edgmont, Haverford, Marple, Middletown, 
Nether Providence, Upper Providence, Newtown, Radnor, 
Ridley, Springfield, Tinicum and parts of Birmingham and 
Thornbury. The boundaries of these townships remain nearly 
the same, no new ones having been created, and only that 01 
Aston and Concord changed. 

The extreme length of the County is twenty miles and 
the extreme breadth fourteen, and it contains about one 
hundred and sixty-five square miles. At the first census in 
1790 the population was 9483. The increase to 1800 was 
3326; that to 1810, 1925 ; to 1820, 84; to 1830, 2513; to 
1840, 2468 ; to 1850, 4888; to i860, 5918 ; and to 1870, 8906, 
making the population in 1870, 39,403. The last rate of 
increase continued would make the present number of inhab- 
itants over forty-six thousand. The small increase given by the 
census returns between 18 10 and 1820, only 84, may be an 
error, due to careless enumerating previously, or if correct, it 
may have arisen from the troubles with England deterring 
emigration. 



HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY. 5 

Chester is the oldest town in the State. The first settlers 
called the place Upland, a name which it bore until Penn 
gave it the present one in 1682. The date of its first settle- 
ment is unknown, but in 1668 it had become the chief town 
of the Upper Delaware settlements, and the place where 
the Courts were held. In 1682, Penn took formal possession of 
his new colony of Pennsylvania and established his govern- 
ment at Chester, where it remained a year or two, when the 
newer City of Philadelphia robbed it of its honor. 

It has been said that the reason Penn did not locate his 
City at Chester was the fear that it might not be within his 
boundaries, and in fact according to the letter of his charter 
from the crown it is not. But the beautiful highland lying 
between the two rivers was doubtless sufficient to induce the 
change; and to the small vessels of that day and with the 
channel of the Delaware as it was then, Philadelphia was 
about as accessible to the Ocean as Chester. 

In 1776 the population of Chester was probably about 
four hundred. Dr. Smith, in his history, page 286, gives us 
one hundred and sixty-eight as the number of taxables in 
Chester township in 1775. The Borough being in the township, 
probably contained the half of these — eighty-four ; assuming 
five persons to one taxable and we have four hundred and 
twenty as the probable population one hundred years ago. 

It is very doubtful whether the number of inhabitants 
increased at all between 1776 and 1827. At the latter date the 
whole number of buildings in the Town was but seventy, 
including barns, stables, and shops ; and six persons to a 
building is a full estimate. Between 1830 and 1840 the 
Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore Railroad was built, 
paissing through Chester, and extensive stone quarries were 
opened in the vicinity furnishing large quantities of stone to 
the Delaware Breakwater. These enterprises gave an impetus 
to the town which in 1840 increased its number of buildings to 
two hundred and twenty-four and its population to something 
over seven hundred. 

In 1850 quite a change had taken place. The seat of 
Justice had been removed, manufacturers had discovered the 
convenience of the town to the sources of the materials they 
needed as well as to the market for their products, and even 
the old residents had begun to think that the Delaware might 
furnish some material good besides fish. 

The census returns of 1850 gave the number of inhabit- 
/ 1 ants as 1667, and those of i860 as 4631. In 1866 the Borough 



6 HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY. 

became a City by act of Legislature, and in 1870 the number 
of inhabitants was 9485. A similar increase since 1870 would 
make the present population over 15,000. The wealth and all 
the material interests of the town have increased in like 
proportion. Manufactories of cotton, wool and iron have 
sprung up all over the place, and probably no town of its size 
in the State exceeds it in industry and enterprise. 

The history of Chester during the century is a remarkable 
one. After a state of almost absolute inertness for sixty-five 
years of that period an increase of population from seven 
hundred to fifteen thousand in the remaining thirty-five years, 
may well suggest an inquiry into the causes, and some of 
these are not difficult to see. Something has been attributed 
to the removal of the seat of Justice, and no doubt that had 
its effect. A certain proportion of the people of a county 
town depends upon the administering of Justice ; the attor- 
neys and other officers of the Courts, the Justices of the 
Peace, constables, tipstaves, tavern keepers, waiters, hostlers 
and a variety of similar non-producers, who hang about the 
public offices with the hope of picking up an occasional 
fee or gratuity. 

Added to these and aiding them in their sphere of useful- 
ness are the large and small politicians of the County, who 
always gravitate to the County seat unless they can make 
more by remaining away and holding it up to public obloquy. 
Where these elements constitute substantially the entire 
population it will be readily seen that the general result is 
stagnation. Progress may be a thing talked of in jolly 
moments around a tavern bar, but it will be as we talk of the 
antipodes, the prehistoric or the coming man, something afar 
off in either time or space or both. 

If the place should once outgrow these elements, forcing 
them into a subordinate position, where they belong, as 
Philadelphia has done, the Courts and their surroundings will 
become relatively less injurious ; but Chester in 1850, had not 
outgrown them, though there were indications that it might 
do so, and the removal of the seat of Justice, doubtless, acted 
as one cause of the great awakening. 

Another, and a greater cause, was the discovery of the 
local advantages of Chester for factories. Philadelphia was 
becoming a great manufacturing city, and it was natural that 
the high rents and expensive living of that city should direct 
the attention of producers to the neighboring towns. Chester 
is upon tide water, about as convenient to coal, iron and other 



HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY. 7 

materials, as Philadelphia, and much more accessible to the 
outside world, being at the head of winter navigation in severe 
seasons, and being the point to which vessels bound upwards 
usually come without towing. The water pow&r of the county- 
had been already appropriated and in many places steam had 
come to be used to compensate for the irregularity of the 
water power. By this means an opportunity was afforded of 
comparing the two powers, and it was ascertained that steam 
upon the tide is quite equal, if not superior in point of econ- 
omy to water power inland. In fact for some years, factory 
sites on streams remote from the river have been abandoned 
for steam on the tide. 

The result of all this is, that an entire new population has 
taken posession of the City of Chester, establishing places of 
productive industry everywhere, building up its vacant lots and 
extending the town beyond its incorporated limits on all sides 
except where the Delaware interposes to prevent it. Many of 
these incomers are from the county, seeking faster modes of 
becoming rich than cultivating the soil, or if not changing 
their business, at least seeking a larger and better field for it. 
Many come from other states, and very many from foreign 
countries. 

As it is the energetic who emigrate, these people brought 
with them more than the average energy of the places from 
which they came, and their advent into Chester was very much 
like that of the European settlers among the aborigines. 
After a little natural jealousy had subsided, the natives, unable 
to resist the stream of progress, have fallen into the current 
10 aid and be aided by it, or have retired to vegetate upon 
the profits arising from the sale of their lands rendered valuable 
without their aid and apparently against their will. The 
Chester of half a century ago forms but an insignificant 
constituent of the Chester of 1876. 

Next to Chester, Marcus Hook appears to be the oldest 
town in Pennsylvania. It was erected into a market town by 
Penn in 1701, by letters patent under the name of Chichester, 
and empowered to hold a weekly market and fair. The letters 
patent speak of it as "aforetime commonly called Marcus 
Hook, and of late usually called Chichester." But the new 
name did not supplant the old one. The Legislature in the 
present charter enacted in 1833, adopted the "aforetime" title. 
Indeed the place had never been called by any other name 
except in a few public documents at least a century old. 

Marcus Hook is quite equal to Chester as an eligible site 



8 HISTORY 07 DELAWARE COUNTY. 

for manufactories, if not superior. The river channel is 
nearer the shore, as well as deeper and broader, and the place 
has not been shut off from the ocean by ice at any time lor 
half a century. Probably the accident of a few enterprising 
men locating themselves at Chester between 1840 and 1850 
fixed that as the city instead of Marcus Hook. Before 1830 
the two places were rivals in inertness and obscurity, surprised 
occasionally by the erection of a new dwelling on the ruins of 
one rotted down. Within a few years Marcus Hook has made 
some spasmodic efforts to imitate her more fortunate sister, 
and unless the old inhabitants succeed in preventing the in- 
flux of energy from abroad, a dozen years more will probably 
develop the natural advantages of the place and make it again 
the rival of Chester. 

In 1850 the population of Marcus Hook was 492. Since 
then the census returns incorporate it with the township of 
Lower Chichester, in which it lies, leaving us to conjecture the 
number of inhabitants. Probably six hundred in 1870 and 
seven hundred and fifty now would be a close estimate. 

Darby was one of the primitive settlements. The early 
travel among the colonists was mainly up and down the river, 
and of necessity it crossed the streams at first at the head of 
tide water. The places of crossing were favorable sites for 
settlements unless the river shore opposite afforded peculiar 
commercial advantages as at Marcus Hook and Chester. This 
determined the location of Darby at the head of tide on Darby 
creek, the country between that and the river being low, 
formerly chiefly covered with water at high tide, and kept 
habitable now by artificial banks. 

Dr. Smith tells us that before the close of 1683 Penn's 
followers "had gained a very permanent footing at Chester, 
Marcus Hook, Darby and Haverford." But up to i860 the 
population of Darby had only reached seven hundred and 
eighty. Since then however, manufacturing enterprises have 
started there and in 1870 the inhabitants numbered twelve 
hundred and five. Probably now they would reach fifteen 
hundred. 

The Borough of Darby was erected in 1853 out of the 
town and part of the township of Darby. 

The Borough of Media, the present seat of Justice of the 
county, was chartered in 1850. It is located very nearly in 
the middle of the county, on the high land between Ridley 
and Crum creeks, about five miles from the river and is from 
two to four hundred feet above the ocean level. The eastern 



HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY. 9 

portion of the town is comparatively level, but the western, 
sloping towards Ridley creek, is quite hilly, making it difficult 
to locate streets and roads in that direction. The vicinity 
presents mountain scenery on a small scale, and is very much 
admired. The high and healthy location, the pure air and the 
wild roads along the wooded streams, suggestive of pleasure 
driving, fill the town with summer visitors, from the neighbor- 
ing city, from which it is distant only thirteen miles. 

Like the county, the county town owes its existence to a 
contest about the seat of Justice. For many years the popu- 
larity of Chester had been upon the wane. Its people had 
given offence by endeavoring to rule the county, and only 
partially succeeding. Jurors, parties and witnesses believed 
themselves to be imposed upon by high charges, and they knew 
themselves to be sneered at and ridiculed by the tavern idlers 
who constituted most of the elite of the town. Besides this, the 
water was bad and the place was charged with being unhealthy, 
especially to people from the higher lands, a charge with little 
or no foundation, for Chester has its full proportion of old men 
and women in a population congregated from a wide range 
of climate. 

In 1820 an ineffectual attempt was made to remove the 
seat of Justice to a more central point. In 1845 ^^ effort was 
renewed, and in 1847 ^m act Assembly was passed submitting 
the question to the votes of the people at the next succeeding 
election. Not knowing or not properly considering how 
migratory a seat of Justice would become if its location were 
voted upon at every election, the people of Chester consented 
to this act. The result was just what might have been 
anticipated, a majority of seven hundred and fifty-two in a vote 
of about three thousand. The location not having been since 
changed, it is hardly necessary to say that the experiment of 
submitting it to the votes of the people has never been tried 
in Delaware county since. 

In the census returns of 1870 the population of Media is 
given as 1045. It is probably now about 1400. At the time 
of the removal, a store, a tavern and two or three farm houses 
constituted the entire town. 

By a provision in the Charter the sale of intoxicating 
drinks is forever prohibited within the Borough limits. The 
consequence is that Media is one of the most peaceable and 
orderly places in the country. 

There are five schools supported by the public and three 
by private subscriptions. The latter are a large and well 



10 HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY. 

patronized school for girls and young women, a large boarding 
school for boys and a select school for both sexes. All these, 
public and private, are in a flourishing condition. 

The Court House is a large and substantial structure, 
built of stone and brick, the first story being fireproof. It is 
eighty-two feet by fifty, with two wings, each thirty-eight feet 
square. The Court room, about sixty feet by forty-six, is in 
the second story. It is approached by two iron stairways in 
front and a wooden one in the rear, all leading from the 
interior of the first story. This story contains the offices of 
the Prothonotary and Clerk of the Criminal Court, the 
Re:ister and Clerk of the Orphans' Court, the Recorder of 
Deeds, the Sherift, the County Treasurer, the Commissioners 
and Superintendent of Common Schools. The building is 
erected in the middle of a rectangle 500 feet by 240, surrounded 
by streets. It is enclosed by an iron fence and is beautifully 
ornamented with shade and forest trees, many of them of rare 
varieties. The Court House square contains no other build- 
ings. The prison is situated across the street from it, and is a 
substantial building adapted to the Pennsylvania system of 
solitary confinement, a system of very doubtful expediency. 

Media is plentifully supplied with places of religious 
worship. One Episcopal, one Methodist, one African Method- 
ist, one Presbyterian, one Roman Catholic, one Baptist and 
two Friends' Meeting Houses. Besides these buildings there 
are others of a quasi public character the buildings owned and 
occupied by the First National Bank of Media, the Delaware 
County Institute of Science, the Delaware County Mutual 
Insurance Company and the Charter House Association — all 
substantial structures adapted to use rather than ornament. 

The Borough owns a dam and water power on Ridley 
creek from which water is forced into a basin located on the 
highest point within the chartered limits, sufficient for any 
imaginable increase of population for another century ; and 
the Media Gas Company lights the town with coal gas at a 
moderate cost. 

South Chester and North Chester Boroughs are mere 
extensions of the City of Chester beyond the incorporated 
limits, the former on the southwest and the latter on the north. 
The same paved streets and brick sidewalks continue with 
nothing to designate the line where one jurisdiction ends and 
the other begins. South Chester was incorporated in 1866, 
and in 1870 the number of inhabitants was 1242, the number 
of voters in 1875 was 299, and judging from this the present 



HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY. II 

population exceeds 1500. North Chester was incorporated in 
1873. The voters in 1875 numbered 199, so that the present 
population exceeds 1000. 

The Borough of Upland adjoins Chester City and North 
Chester Borough. It was founded by the late John P. Crozer 
about the year 1845 and the entire Borough is still owned 
mainly by his children. It was incorporated in 1869 and in 
1870 the population was 1341. It is probably now 1600. 
Extensive Cotton Mills make up the great business of the 
place, and the neat rows of comfortable brick houses, the 
Church, Sunday School and Library testify to the regard the 
enterprising owners have for the population in their employ- 
ment. 

The City of Chester and the surrounding Boroughs of 
North and South Chester and Upland as well as parts of the 
adjoining townships of Chester, Lower Chichester and Ridley 
constitute really but a single large manufacturing town with a 
population of more than twenty thousand, rapidly approaching 
Marcus Hook to absorb it, and destined in a very few years to 
connect with Philadelphia along the highlands occupied by 
the new route of the Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore 
Railroad, and the old King's Highway. The river shore 
between Chester and Marcus Hook, must become the port of 
Philadelphia, unless that city is content to give up its foreign 
commerce altogether ; and it is not unsafe to predict that the 
child is living who will see the southern limits of what will be 
substantially the City of Philadelphia at the Delaware State 
line. 

It is impossible within the limits allowed to enumerate the 
factories, mills, machine shops, and other business establish- 
ments of Chester and its surroundings, or to name the 
enterprising men who have made the place what it is ; and to 
designate a few of either out of the many would be an 
invidious task. 

Besides these municipalities there are many towns mainly 
devoted to manufactures not yet arisen to the dignity of 
corporations. Those containing one hundred inhabitants 
and over are Village Green, Rockdale and Crozerville in 
Aston township ; Chelsea in Bethel township ; Concordville 
in Concord ; Leiperville, Ridley Park, Eddystone and Nor- 
wood in Ridley ; Sharon Hill in Darby : Howell ville in Edg- 
mont ; Coopertown in Haverford ; Lima, Lenni, Glen Riddle 
and Knowlton in Middletown ; Newtown Square in Newtown ; 
Waterville and South Media in Nether Providence ; Morton 



12 HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY. 

in Springfield ; Morgan's corner in Radnor ; Glen Mills in 
Thornbury ; Linwood in Lower Chichester ; and Clilton, 
Garrettford, Kellyville and Fernwood in Upper Darby. 

All these towns including the City of Chester, are 
mainly the work of the last thirty-five years, and during the 
same period the rate of increase in the county, has been 
such as, if continued, willg've us a quarter of a million inhabi- 
tants before the lapse of another century. 

One hundred years ago the great business of the county 
was agriculture, and all other kinds of business were subser- 
vient to it ; the land was devoted almost entirely to the 
raising of grain and the raising and fattening of cattle. The 
growth of Philadelphia and the filling up of the country around 
it have changed all this. Agriculture is still a leading inter- 
est, but its products are different now. Instead of sending 
out of the county for sale wheat, corn and beef, we send milk, 
butter, hay, garden vegetables and small fruits, articles form- 
erly supplied to Philadelphia from a nearer source. For half 
a century, the corn, wheat and oats raised in the county have 
not been sufficient for its own use. 

Besides this change, the cultivation of the soil has become 
second in importance to manufactures and mechanical produc- 
tions. For some years the great productive business of the 
county has been the manufacturing of woolen goods and of 
iron, the last embracing the making of edge tools, steam 
engines and other machinery. 

Chester, Ridley, Crum and Darby creeks with several 
smaller streams cross the county emptying into the Delaware. 
The fall on each of these streams is from one to two hundred 
feet, affording many water powers of moderate size. In 1827 
the number of these occupied was 158, and the number 
unoccupied 42. Of those occupied 38 were used for flour 
mills, 53 for saw mills, 27 for cotton and woolen mills, ii for 
paper mills and 5 for manufactures of iron. 

In 1850 a great change had taken place in these mill 
seats ; the saw mills had mainly disappeared with the surplus 
timber of the county ; the lumber for building and even for 
fencing had come to be mainly supplied from the banks of 
the Susquehanna and elsewhere. The increase of population 
in the county, and its contiguity to Philadelphia had turned 
the farms over to the dairy and horticulture and the fxour mills 
mainly vanished with the wheat and corn fields leaving place 
to manufactures of cotton and wool. In 1827 the products 
of these were made by hand loom.s except in a single instance. 



4 



HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY. 1 3 

Lewis & Phillips in 1825 established the first power loom 
mill in the county. John P. Crozer began weaving with power 
looms in 1830 and others soon followed, until in 1850 most of 
the water powers of the county were used for these products. 
All over the county manufacturing villages had sprung up, 
giving the farmer a market almost at his own door for his 
milk, butter, eggs, poultry, and the products of his garden, 
paying him largely for the lack of a wheat crop even if, as was 
often the case, he had to buy his own flour. 

After 1850 another change took place ; the water powers 
began to be deserted by these establishments for locations on 
the tide, coal had begun to supplant water power, both by 
reason of convenience and economy, and the factories sought 
the places handiest to that new force. This has built up 
Chester and its suburbs, and while manufactures have 
steadily increased since that time, it is no uncommon thing 
now to see the ruins of old abandoned factories crumbling 
into the unused streams that formerly kept their busy wheels 
and busy hands moving. 

In 1827 the number of persons employed in the manu- 
facture of cotton and woolen goods in the county was 643, in 
1870 the number had increased to 4030, and the value of the 
products during the same period rose from ^400,000 per 
annum to nearly $7,000,000. Since 1870 the business has 
been steadily on the increase, except that the present stagna- 
tion in all industries is affecting that also. The number of 
looms now running in the county is about 5000, and the 
number of spindles 200,000. 

Paper making was first commenced in the county at 
Ivy Mills in Concord township, by Thomas Wilcox in 1720 
His descendants of the same family name still own and use 
the same mill site for the same purpose. A branch of the 
establishment was afterwards fixed in Glen Mills in Thornbury 
township, by the same parties, and at this latter place the 
paper used by the Government for the currency is made. 

In i860 there were 119 hands employed in making 
$180,898 worth of materials into $345,000 worth of paper, 
and in 1870 the workmen had increased to 135, the materials 
to $260,080 in value, and the products to $383,000. There 
is no reason to suppose that the same rate of increase has not 
continued up to the present time. 

The first railroad in the United States was built in 
Nether Providence township, in this county, by Thomas 
Leiper, in 1806. The engineer was John Thompson, the 



14 HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY, 

father of the late President of the Pennsylvania Railroad 
Company, and the original draft of the road is in the museum 
of the Delaware County Institute. The length of the road 
was a mile and a quarter, and it was constructed and used for 
years in carrying stone from the quarries on Crum Creek 
to the landing. 

The Columbia, Lancaster and Philadelphia Railroad 
Company was chartered in 1826. The road ran through the 
townships of Radnor and Haverford. The Pennsylvania 
Railroad Company, the present possessor of the road, was 
chartered in 1846 ; the route is now changed so as to run 
through the township of Radnor only. When the Columbia 
Railroad was projected, there was considerable alarm in this 
county, lest interior competition would so lower prices in the 
Philadelphia markets as to break up the farmers ; here and 
when steam was introduced as a motive power, horses would 
certainly become valueless; yet grain and horses have steadily 
risen in price ever since. 

The Philadelphia,Wilmington & Baltimore Railroad Com- 
pany was chartered in 1836, and in 1838 the road was in 
operation. In 1872 the company constructed what is known 
as the Darby Improvement branch, by which the route from 
Chester to Philadelphia was changed from the marsh lands 
along the river to the higher table land westward. The old 
road between those two cities has been since sold or leased 
for a long term of years to the Reading Railroad Company 
by which it is now operated. 

This latter company has within a few years become the 
owner of a tract of land of about three hundred and fifty acres 
on the river above and adjoining Marcus Hook, and being the 
owner of the Front street railroad which connects the old 
route of the Baltimore railroad with that land, it has become 
one of the railroads of the county. 

The West Chester & Philadelphia Railroad Company was 
chartered in 1848. The road enters the county from the 
west in the valley of Chester creek, and continues in the 
valleyato Glen Riddle, from which place it crosses the country 
through Media to Philadelphia. 

The Chester Creek Railroad Company was charrered in 
1866. This road connects the West Chester railroad with 
Chester by running from Lenni down the valley of Chester 
Creek. It also connects with the Baltimore Direct Railroad 
at Pennellton, the owners of which were chartered in 1853. 
Intersected as the county is in various directions by these 



HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY, 15 

means of communication, it is safe to say that there is no 
point within its borders five miles distant from a raih^oad. 

Our county has its full share of business corporations. 
Among them are the Delaware County National Bank char- 
tered in 1 8 14 by the State, and converted into a National 
Bank in 1864, the First National Bank of Chester and the 
First National Bank of Media, both chartered in 1864. The 
last is located at Media and the other two at Chester. 

The Delaware County Mutual Insurance Company, at 
Media, and the Chester Mutual Insurance Company, at 
Chester, insure against losses by fire, but the most of this 
insuring is done by companies elsewhere. The local companies 
being preferred partly on account of the cheapness of their 
rates, and partly because their managers are well known, 
obtain all the risks they will taKe ; but this is only a small 
portion of the demand for insurance. 

Building Associations, an invention of very modern 
times, have had their full share of patronage since their first 
introduction in 1852, and through their operations hundreds 
of laboring men and others of small means, who otherwise 
would not have saved a dollar, are now living in their own 
comfortable homes. In the hands of conscientious men, 
these institutions are a great blessing to people of sn-;all 
resources, but they are liable to abuse by harsh, hard and 
unscrupulous managers. 

The people of our County are essentially a newspaper 
reading community. The various Philadelphia papers circu- 
late largely among us and our local press is deservedly well 
patronized. The oldest existing paper of the County is The 
Delaware Coimty Republican. It was established in 1833 and 
still continues with the same name, the same owner and 
the same general character. Its politics were Whig while 
that party lasted, and afterwards Republican. Its columns 
have always been devoted to the cause of liberty, temperance 
and good morals. In 1855 The Ddaivare County American 
commenced. It is still published in the same ownership, and 
its general character and standing, as well as its political 
course and the principles inculcated, have always been sim- 
ilar to and of like high moral tone with those of the Republican. 
In 1835 the first number of the Delaware County Democrat 
appeared. At the end of the year it was suspended and after 
along trance it revived in 1867 and is still published. Its 
politics have been generally Democratic. In 1 873 The Dem- 
ocratic Pilot and The Weekly Mail \sqxq, first issued, the former 



1 6 HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY. 

Democratic and the latter neutral in politics. The Daily News 
the only daily paper published in the County was established 
the same year. Tlie Delaivarc Coiuity Advocate commenced 
in 1869. It is independent in politics, but of Republican 
proclivities, and devoted to the cause of temperance. 

Several papers which were of importance in their day 
have ceased to exist. The first ever published in the County 
was a neutral paper called the Post Boy. It appeared in 18 19 
and in 1820 it changed owners, name and politics, becoming 
the Upland Union, and democratic. Under this name it con- 
tinued until 1842. In 1856 it was revived for a life of six 
months. The Weekly Visitor was published from 1826 to 
1833. Its chief political feature was its opposition to the 
order of Free Masons. 

In 1848 Dr. Joshua W. Ash, a member of this body, 
published the first map of Delaware County. The material 
for it was obtained with great care and much labor, partly 
from the records of the county and private title papers and 
partly from actual surveys. It exhibits not only the towns, 
roads and streams, the school houses, places of religious wor- 
ship, post offices and mills, but the farm boundary lines, with 
the names of the owners; and for a work of so much detail it 
is singularly accurate. It is believed to be the first instance 
in America in which so large a district of country has been 
mapped so minutely as to show the comparative size, shape 
and ownership of all the homesteads of even a few acres. 
Within half a dozen years other maps of the county have been 
published, largely copied from this one and showing the 
recent changes. 

In the moral aspect of the subject, the religious denom- 
inations of the rounty demand the first attention. Constitut- 
ing as they did almost the entire colony of Penn, the Friends 
for the first half century greatly outnumbered all the other 
sects. The colony, however, being by the benign system of 
its founder open equally to all, other denominations had 
obtained considerable footing prior to the commencement of 
the century now closing, and during that century the Friends 
have become but a small portion of the religious element of 
the county. The decendants of these people, however, con- 
stitute the majority of the population, and their distinctive 
peculiarities sensibly affect the entire county. The hostility 
to oppression, whether on account of sex, race or opinions, 
the opposition to the use of intoxicating drinks, to judicial and 
profane swearing, to war, and especially to "playing soldier" in 



HISTORY OP DELAWARE COUNTY. 1/ 

time of peace, which characterize us, came from this source. 
Persons from elsewhere visiting our Courts, are surprised to 
find the oath rarely taken by either juror or witness. 

It is to be remembered that hostility to war did not pre- 
vent the descendants of the Friends nor the Friends them- 
selves from engaging in it to suppress the recent rebellion. 
Probably they saw the issue and while they did not hate war 
the less they hated slavery more. It has been truly remarked 
that during that struggle the Friends furnished quite as much 
aid to the government in proportion to their number, as any 
other people, both in men and money, and that it was all 
contributed on the right side. 

In i860 the Friends numbered sixteen congregations 
with church accommodations for 5280 people. In 1870 the 
numbers had not sensibly changed. Within a year a new 
meeting house has been erected in Media, with the capacity 
of about five hundred seats. With this exception the num- 
bers remain the same, but the church accommodations, it is 
believed, bear a much larger proportion to the actual members 
than in other societies. 

The earliest form of religious worship by the settlers 
seems to have been the Lutheran, introduced by the Swedes. 
Upon the advent of the English this form gave way to that 
of the church of England, which it much resembles. The 
first Episcopalians probably associated with the Lutherans in 
their worship, soon outnumbering and absorbing them. But 
in 1700 distinct Episcopal organizations began to appear, and 
the Rev. Mr. Evans was sent from England to attend to their 
wants. He appears to have officiated for several years after 
that date at Marcus Hook, Chester, Concord and Radnor. 

The first church at Marcus Hook was built in 1702, the 
first one in Chester in 1704 and the first one in Concord in 
1724. The Church of Radnor, now within the limits of 
Newtown township, was erected in 17 17 and is still standing. 
It is the oldest church building in the county, except that of 
the Friends in Haverford, which was erected in 1700. 

In i860 the Episcopal congregations numbered seven, 
with church accommodations for 2325 people. In 1870 the 
numbers were about the same, and since that date there has 
been some increase of members, but no changes in congreg- 
ations or churches. 

As a distinct sect the Methodists arose about the period 
of the American Revolution, and out of that event. For some 
years prior their had been attempts on the part of John 



15 HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY. 

Wesley and others to awaken, within the Church of England, 
a livelier interest in practical and devotional Christianity. 
But it is not likely that a new sect would have arisen out of 
these efforts if the Church of the mother country had not 
been cut off" by the rebellion of the colonies from aiding and 
controlling its members here. The large majority of the 
adherents to that form of worship in the colonies, including 
the more violent Whigs and others of anti-English prejudices, 
refusing to await the close of hostilities for communication 
with the mother church, proceeded to organize under the 
Episcopal form, independent of the Old Country. The 
minority, embracing the wealthier and more educated portion 
and also those whose respect for the mother country was 
greatest, did not unite in this movement. The result was 
that at the close of the war, there were two Episcopal organ- 
izations in the Country, one in accord with the Church of 
England and the other not. 

At that time there was no separate organization in 
England. But the earnest followers of John Wesley inside 
the National Church were called Methodists as a term of 
reproach by their less serious brethern. The name imported 
here soon ceased to be a term of reproach, and the anti- 
English Episcopal organization adopted the term of Methodist 
Episcopal. 

Few Methodist churches were built in Delaware County 
prior to 1800, but since that date this denomination has 
increased faster than any other. In i860 the congregations 
numbered 16, with church accommodations for 4360 people. 
In 1870 the latter had increased to 7900, and the increase 
since then has probably been in the same ratio. 

Very soon after the first settlement of the Enghsh in 
Pennsylvania, the hardy and enterprising sub-race known as 
"Scotch-Irish," began to locate among us. These were mainly 
Presbyterians. They were descendants of the Scotch who 
had been encouraged to settle in Ireland a few generations 
before by the British government, and they preserved their 
national form of religion through the two emigrations. 

As it is always the more energetic of any people who leave 
their homes voluntarily for a new country, each emigration of 
these Scotchmen took out from the mass the most active, 
earnest and restless, and this accounts for the peculiar force 
of character which distinguishes the Scotch-Irish in the new 
countries. They have really a double distillation of energy. 

The first congregation of Presbyterians in this County 



HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY. I9 

met in Middletown at or near the site of the Middletown 
Presbyterian Church, about a mile west of Media, soon after 
the beginning of the eighteenth century ; certainly before 
1735. Others soon followed, but the chief increase of the 
sect in this County has been since 1820. In i860 they had 
seven congregations with church capacity of 2630. In 1870 
the former had increased to nine and the latter to 3700. The 
increase since has been in like proportion. 

The first organization of Baptists was in 171 5. This 
was the Brandywine Baptist Church in Birmingham township. 
Meetings had before that time been held in private houses, and 
the rite of Baptism was performed in this County as early as 
1697. Most of the early Baptists appear to have been 
previously Friends, and a record bearing date May 4, 171 5' 
quoted by Smith, indicates that these people preserved some 
of their peculiarities of phraseology after their change. 

In i860 there were five congregations of this denomina- 
tion in the County, with church accommodations for 2225 
people. In 1870 the former had increased to six and the 
latter to 2500. Since then new churches have been built and 
new congregations established at South Chester, North 
Chester, and Media, and the accommodations probably now 
number 3500. The number of actual members at present is 
1463. 

The first establishment of Catholics in the county was 
at the residence of Thomas Willcox, at Ivy Mills, in Concord 
township, in 1730. The congregation was small and the 
increase of the sect was very slow until 1835, since then it is 
quite rapid, mainly from abroad. In i860 there were five 
congregations in the county with church accommodations for 
1980 people. In 1870 the former had increased to seven and 
the latter to 2550. The increase since is doubtless at the 
same rate. In 1757 the number of Catholics in Chester 
county was 120. Of these probably half resided in the part 
which is now Delaware county. The number now is not less 
than 2500. 

A beautiful little structure built at Cheyney Station on 
the West Chester and Philadelphia Railroad, well deserves a 
notice at this point. It is called the Wayside Church and is 
independent of all other organizations. It was erected by 
members of various religious sects, aided by many attached 
to no denomination, and it is open to all professors of religion, 
the services being varied to suit the views of the particular 
officiating individual, who may be some one invited by the 



20 HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY. 

congregation, or some well meaning clergyman or other 
person who may feel it his duty, for the time, to occupy the 
pulpit. In the absence of such person, services much resem- 
bling the Episcopal are read by one of the members desig- 
nated for the occasion. The congregation numbers about two 
hundred. 

The place owes its origin to the efforts of certain liberal 
minded people in the neighborhood, whose design appears to 
be to bring members of the several religious bodies more in 
contact with one another, that they may learn how insignifi- 
cant are the differences of opinion which have filled Christen- 
dom with persecution and bloodshed. The result is teaching 
on a small scale the lesson that most religious disputes are 
purely dialectic. The sects being isolated, learn to attach 
peculiar and technical meanings to certain much used words, 
and therefore, to some extent, really talk each a different 
language from the other without knowing it. 

The movement at Cheyney appears to be in the direction 
of the progress of the age. Within the last half century there 
is manifestly a growing tendency among the various religious 
denominations to co-operate with one another in benevolent 
and humanitarian enterprises, and to view the peculiarities of 
of one another in a more charitable light ; and there is a 
decreasing disposition on the part of each, to claim the 
exclusive right of regulating the relations existing between 
man and his Maker. Delaware County has its full share of 
the wholesome progress in this direction. 

To the history of every county in the Union belongs the 
subject of slavery and its extinction. In the great struggle 
all took part on one side or the other. From a very early date 
our county stood enrolled on the side of human rights. In 
1696 the society of Friends, then constituting almost the 
entire colony, began the contest ; first by prohibiting its 
members from importing slaves, next by proscribing the 
traffic in them ; then by requiring them to be kindly treated 
and taught to write, and finally one hundred years ago the 
society abolished slavery among its members. 

In 1780 the Legislature of Pennsylvania passed an act 
making children born of slave parents after its date free, and 
requiring those then living to be registered or in default 
thereof manumitting them. Under this act 146 were regis- 
tered as slaves for life and sixteen as slaves for a term of 
years in the part of Chester county which nine years after 
became Delaware. Of these there were none in the townships 



HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY. 21 

of Bethel, Birmingham, Upper Chichester, Upper Providence, 
Nether Providence and Radnor. 

This Act of Assembly was the first instance of the 
abolition of slavery by legislation in the United States, and 
it shows that though the government of the State had long- 
before passed out of the hands of the followers of Penn, their 
hostility to slavery had communicated itself to their fellow- 
citizens. 

The proportion of the descendants of these primitive 
people is greater in our county than anywhere else in the 
State, and here too has always been the most universal, quiet, 
persistent hatred of slavery. This was exhibited in 1850 as 
well as on other occasions. When the fugitive slave law was 
passed it provided for the appointment of commissioners in 
the several counties to carry out its provisions. But in 
Delaware county no man could be found willing to accept the 
appointment, and it remained unfilled. 

Dr. Smith thinks that the number of slaves in lyj^) was 
not less than three hundred ; in 1780 these had doubtless 
decreased, and though those registered under the act were 
not all that remained, yet by virtue of the act, those not 
registered became free, leaving the number after that date 
162. 

The crusade against the use of intoxicaring drinks which 
began, at least in its extreme violence, about forty years ago, 
very soon took full possession of this county. Our people by 
their origin and training were prepared for it. It is curious 
to contrast 1826 with 1876 in this respect. Then the man 
who totally abstained from the use of alcohol was supposed by 
his neighbors to have "a screw loose" somewhere ; stands 
were kept at public sales to supply bidders with what was 
thought a prime necessity to life, and usually half a dozen 
fights relieved the monotony of the auctioneer's proceedings. 
Laborers had their daily allowance of "grog" and children 
were supposed to run a great risk of life unless provided with 
their morning dose of "tansy bitters" during the autumn 
months ; visitors knew they were unwelcome unless some 
intoxicating beverage were offered them ; whisky could be 
had at every corner grocery, at eight or ten cents per quart, 
as cheap as milk, and many a family dispensed with the 
useless luxury of a cow that the indispensable substitute might 
be supplied. 

Delaware county was not peculiar in this, nor in the 
gradual change to a better state of things. But this may be 



22 HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY. 

<« 

said, that until recently, the improvement here was more 
thorough and radical than in most other places. We had 
come to look upon the habitual use of stimulants as a dis- 
qualification for any important public or private business. 

It is admitted on all sides that the last year or two has 
presented the aspect of relapse, but the causes are local, and 
temporary, and the retrograde movement can only be for a 
time. A community sending so large a proportion of its 
earnings outside of its borders to purchase that which brought 
into it only increases the cost of courts, prisons, and alms- 
houses, must soon become poor, and the economy into which 
it will be forced is upon the road upwards. 

The progress of the county in general education has 
kept pace during the century with its material advancement. 
One hundred years ago there were no schools in the county 
for the education of the general public, except a few under 
the charge of the Society of Friends maintained by private 
subscriptions. In 1836 the common school system was es- 
tablished, at first as a measure to be accepted or rejected by 
the townships. Our county at once accepted it, and from 
that time we have been steadily increasing its efficiency. 
Now no child however low its circumstances need grow up 
among us without such training as will develop whatever of 
intellect he has, and enable him to compete in the race of 
life on fair terms with the most fortunate. 

Beside the public schools, some private institutions de- 
serve notice. Haverford College was established by the 
Society of Friends in 1833, in Haverford township, on the 
Pennsylvania Railroad, ten miles from Philadelphia. The 
farm belonging to the College contains about two hundred 
acres. The Institution will accommodate about sixty stu- 
dents. The teaching is classical, mathematical and scientific, 
and is in no sense of the word sectarian. 

Swarthmore College, also belonging to the Society of 
Friends, is upon the West Chester and Philadelphia Railroad, 
about two miles east of Media. It was founded in 1869. 
The average number of students is about two hundred and 
twenty-five, and the whole number of graduates to this time 
is thirty-five. 

This Institution is devoted to the education of both 
sexes, the projectors being satisfied that under proper care 
the presence of each will benefit the other, and the result has 
fully justified the soundness of this view. The course of 
instruction is the same for both sexes, and the experiment 



HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY. 23 

has shown that there is no sensible difference in their capacity 
for the higher degrees of mental training. 

The Crozer Theological Seminary owes its existence to 
the liberality of the late John P. Crozer and his family. It is 
located in the Borough of Upland, and it commenced under 
its present organization in 1868. The endowment of the 
College is 1^230,000, and its library has cost ^25,000. It is 
under the charge of the Baptists, and its name denotes its 
general design. The average number of students ts about 
fifty. 

The Pennsylvania Institution for training Feeble Minded 
Children, established In 1859, near Media, is partly a private 
charity and partly a public enterprise. The possibility of 
enabling these unfortunate people to better their condition 
mentally has only been admitted within the past few years, 
and the success of this institution renders it no longer a 
question. Unless in rare cases, in which the intellect is very 
low indeed, what mind there is has shown itself capable of 
improvement, in the more fortunate of the class, indeed, until 
the deficiency becomes scarcely perceptible. 

The Delaware County Institute of Science must not be 
omitted in the history of Delaware County. On September 
2 1 St, 1833, five individuals organized this Institution. The 
number soon increasing, they obtained a charter from the 
Supreme Court of the State in 1836, and in 1837 built a hall 
in Upper Providence which was occupied until 1867, v/hen it 
was abandoned for a new one erected in the Borough of 
Media. The object of the Association was the promotion of 
general knowledge, and the establishment of a museum. 
The founders were George Miller, Minshall Painter, John 
Miller, Dr. George Smith and John Cassin. Dr. Smith was 
elected President of the Institute, and he has been annually 
re-eleeted ever since. He is the only one of the five now 
living. 

The Library of the Institute contains 2000 volumes, and 
the Museum has become an extensive collection of highly 
interesting curiosities — Indian Relics, Zoological Specimens, 
Minerals, Coins, Birds, Insects. The number of members is 
now 197. The meetings are held monthly, and they furnish 
matters of interest and utility to those who attend them. 

Another subject belonging to the progress of the age 
requires notice here, because our county is not only in the 
line of progress in that direction but in the front of the line, 
and that is the recognition of the rights of humanity inde- 



24 HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY. 

pendent of the power to enforce them. 

Those whom accident or force has made the ruling class 
are willing at last to carry out to its legitimate consequences 
the great principle of political ethics that governments derive 
their just powers only from the consent ot the governed. 

Hence, men of African descent have been enfranchised. 
Hence, too, the New Constitution of the State permits 
women to be elected to offices controlling education ; and 
hence, too, a great political party, a few days ago dared to 
incorporate among its principles a full recognization. of the 
civil and political rights of women. 

We are more worthy to count this advance a part of our 
county's history for the century, because in our county and in 
its county town, the first elective office in Pennsylvania ever 
held by a woman was conferred upon her, and that, too, only 
a few weeks after it first became possible. 

We are entering upon the second century of our national 
existence. What does it promise us .-' It will not do to say 
that there is not just as much room for progress as there was 
in 1776. The world still moves. To cease developing is to 
die. It may be said that it is safe to predict so long in 
advance, for we run small risk of being upbraided with our 
mistakes. But there is present reason for believing that in 
1976 Delaware County will contain a quarter of a million 
inhabitants, intelligent and industrious, for these are conditions 
precedent to progress ; sober, for intemperance long before 
that time will either "destroy or be destroyed ;" with equal 
rights in the making and administering of the laws, in the 
enjoyment of the fruits of the earth, and in the freedom of 
individual opinions, without distinction on account of sex, 
race or religion. 



LRBJt-78 



